A Day on the Bay Shore, 



tide comes stealthily lapping in, the 

 shore birds grow more and more rest- 

 less, and the swimming birds come 

 flying past on the lookout for pools of 

 deep water. A male butterball duck 

 passes on whistling wings, showing his 

 fine black and white plumage. Then 

 follows a flock of big, white-winged 

 scoters that splash into the water just 

 off a rocky point where mussels are 

 plenty. A little company of Forster's 

 terns flit about just on the edge of 

 shallow water, with their airy grace of 

 movement, their long, slender wings 

 and tail, their silver-blue and snowy- 

 white plumage, and their lightsome 

 plunges into the water after fish. 



There is something strangely impress- 

 ive about the silence of these shore 

 birds. We are so accustomed to asso- 

 ciate song, or at least the sweet calls of 

 our woodland vocalists, with bird life, 

 that to see the great stretches of ex- 

 posed shore crowded with birds that are 

 either silent or uttering strange cries, 



lOO 



i 



